


It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

by tsvtrying (eveofjune)



Series: Merry Christmas, tsvtwt [4]
Category: Twosetviolin
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Christmas, Christmas Angst, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, PLEASE READ AND HEED THE TAGS, Swearing, barista!brett, do not read if you get triggered by that, fish farm, lots of swearing, oh yes we have moved into the painful category now, thank god for that blessed tag, this is painful as fuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28243881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eveofjune/pseuds/tsvtrying
Summary: day 4 of my christmas giftset to tsvtwt.
Relationships: Brett Yang & Original Character(s), Eddy Chen & Brett Yang, Eddy Chen & Original Character(s), Eddy Chen/Brett Yang
Series: Merry Christmas, tsvtwt [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2059164
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inoot (@brett_simpp on twitter)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=inoot+%28%40brett_simpp+on+twitter%29).



> and so it begins >:)
> 
> thank you to sam, carol and aly for beta-ing while my regular betas were mia (not your fault bbs, i couldn't wait omg)

_ for noot _

**It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas**

_ 22 December 2020 _

Brett buries his head in his arms, nursing a splitting headache. It's too early in the morning; he can't tell if it's because of the hangover or Mariah Carey played on loop. 

_ I just want you for my own _

_ More than you could ever know _

_ Make my wish come true _

_ All I want for Christmas is you _

He hits the off button on the radio with much more force than is strictly necessary, and relishes the near silence of the empty Starbucks. It's been a year, and Brett doesn't need anymore reminders of his bloody singledom and loneliness. 

As if the extravagant decorations in every corner of every shopping mall aren't enough. There are trees in every shop window, tinsel on every possible surface, and millions and millions of posters boasting holiday sales. And don't even get him started on the  _ endless  _ loop of too-bright and too-cheery Christmas songs. 

He'd spent the previous night (and the one before that, and the one before that) drinking himself into oblivion, alone, numbing himself to the world. Brett wishes the pain will go away, but as usual it only comes back biting harder in the morning. 

The familiar 12-bell melody intro (yes, he's counted) suddenly rings through the cafe, and Brett groans. He turns in anguish, to see his shift partner lip-syncing to Mariah Carey's overly flourishing runs. 

"Emma,  _ please.  _ I've heard this song more times than I've heard Canon in D at weddings." 

Emma laughs a tinkly laugh that sounds like small bells. It hurts Brett's ears. 

"There's no one  _ here,  _ Emma. We don't have to play any music."

"Aren't you a musician? I thought you liked music." 

This conversation is making Brett's head hurt. "I like silence more." 

* * *

  
  


_ I don't want a lot for Christmas  _

_ There is just one thing I need _

_ I don't care about the presents _

_ Underneath the Christmas tree _

  
  
  
  


_ Fuck emotional catharsis,  _ Eddy thinks.  _ Fuck this. This was a bad idea.  _

Eddy's bent over panting in the middle of fucking  _ nowhere _ , with a bucket of  _ fish _ and a run-down car whose windows won't roll down and air-conditioning doesn't work. This wasn't even his idea, for God's sakes, it was Alexa's, and she's laughing at him from her perch on the car hood. 

"Shut up," He snarls, glaring at her with liquid fire in his eyes. She only laughs harder, and Eddy has a sudden urge to throw the entire bucket of fish at her. 

"Goddammit Alexa. Of  _ all  _ the things we could have done," He starts. "Of  _ all  _ the motherfucking things we could have done, we had to go to a  _ fish farm _ ."

Alexa smiles at him. "You had fun." 

Eddy wants to strangle her. "Yeah,  _ until  _ we were going to  _ pay  _ for the fish and you  _ grabbed  _ my hand and made a fucking break for it." He's yelling now, and Alexa's smirk only grows. "WE FUCKING STOLE  _ FISH  _ ALEXA.  _ FISH.  _ AND WHAT DO WE GET FOR ALL OF THIS? NOTHING! WE'RE STUCK HERE IN GOD-ONLY-KNOWS, WITH A GODDAMN BUCKET OF FISH AND A CAR THAT HAS NO GAS." 

That stops her. "The car is out of gas?" 

"Yeah,  _ no shit Sherlock.  _ Speeding away to 'it doesn’t matter where, just go!' tends to use up a CRAP TON OF GAS." 

Alexa is in denial. "No." 

"Deny it all you want, Lex," Eddy mutters in resignation. "We're stuck here."

_ At the least we're not anywhere near  _ him _ ,  _ Eddy thinks bitterly.  _ There's no way I'm going to be able to see him here.  _

* * *

  
  


"You do know you can't keep drinking your head off trying to avoid your feelings forever?" 

"Oh, fuck off, Emma," Brett groans as he fills up a cup of caramel latte.  _ This is Eddy's favourite—No. You turned down the job at the bubble tea store for exactly this reason.  _ "I'm not. It's just for Christmas, then things will be back to normal." 

Emma scoffs, writing a name on an order. "Yeah and how long more after that are you planning to lie to yourself?" 

He turns tiredly, and Emma glares at him with her hands on her hips. "Listen. I'm not lying to myself. It's over between me and Eddy, there's no point pining over him." 

" _ 'No point pining over him'?  _ Brett," Emma starts incredulously. "What do you call getting yourself drunk every night if not pining?" 

"It's… complicated."

Emma rolls her eyes. "It never is, really. People just say that as an excuse not to face their problems."

"Fucking hell, Emma, I don't need you lecturing me okay? I've got everything under control." 

Emma ignores this. "Do you still love him or not?"

"How is this going to change anything—" 

_ "Do you still love him or not?"  _

__ "Yes! Okay? I'm still hung up over my best friend who broke up with me a year ago. Does it make you  _ happy  _ now to hear it?" 

"Why would it make a difference to me?" Emma replies coolly. "It's  _ your  _ relationship. That you are telling to the whole cafe, by the way," She adds in an undertone. "Maybe keep your dulcet tones for your neighbour at 2am tonight, people are staring." 

Brett looks around and his cheeks burn. 

The lady at the front of the queue bats her eyelashes at him. "I may not know much, but that girl who dumped you must have had shit for brains," She starts, eyeing him up and down. "And what I  _ do  _ know, is that the best way to get over an ex is sex. Good, mind-blowing sex. And I know where you can get some of that," she continues, sliding a napkin with a number across the counter with a dainty hand with hot-pink fingernails. 

Brett stares at her. "I'm gay." 

The sultry smile disappears immediately, replaced quickly by an embarrassed blush. It gives Brett some sort of sick satisfaction, as she scurries off without waiting for her coffee. 

He grabs the caramel latte and the label he scrawled on hastily, calling out the order number. It's a young man, brown hair, tousled curls and gold-rimmed glasses.  _ Fuck.  _

"Hey," The customer says, like the smooth motherfucker he probably is. "I uh, couldn't help but overhear your conversation just now."  _ Who the fuck could?  _ Brett thinks. "The lack of tact people have these days, huh? There are better ways to hit people up—”

“Goodbye,” Brett interrupts, shoving the rambling customer’s coffee in his face. “Here’s your caramel latte, uh…” Fuck, he can’t even read his own handwriting. “Yeah, goodbye.”

“But—” 

“Not interested.  _ Bye. _ ” He turns his back on the retreating back of the customer, Ed-something, and presses his fingers to his temples. The headache is coming back now.

“So you still love him,” Emma repeats, as though they hadn’t been interrupted.

“ _ Yes, _ Emma. God!” Brett groans in frustration. “Your  _ point?” _

__ “My  _ point,  _ you whiny piece of shit, is that you need to stop drinking yourself to hell and back, and confront him.  _ Talk  _ to him, for fuck’s sake. Goddammit Brett, it’s like you don’t even want yourself to be happy.”

“I do,” Brett sighs softly, and Emma sees the first signs of him falling apart. “But I want him to be happy more. And he’s happier without me, isn’t he?”

* * *

  
  


Eddy violently kicks the tire of the car, cursing with anger. Alexa jumps; she’s never seen Eddy this angry, or emotionally broken before. (Only Brett has.)

“Fuck you Lex, why the hell did I let you drag me out here? I told you I just needed a place to stay for the holidays, I didn’t say I needed a  _ friend _ .” Alexa winces. She knows he doesn’t mean any of it, but it still hurts.

“All I said on the phone, was  _ ‘Hey Lex, can I stay over at your place for like a week? Just until Christmas is over? Yeah, my relationship with Brett is great, I just think it would be better to not be together for the season, with what the break-up and everything.’  _ and you said yes.  _ Where _ , tell me fucking where, in that entire conversation did I ask you to help me find emotional catharsis? I was going to be perfectly content sitting at your place, sleeping in, binging shitty Chinese dramas on Netflix and drinking bubble tea and alcohol, and eating instant noodles out of a cup. But  _ nooo _ , you just had to drag me out of bed on a Tuesday morning to go to a motherfucking  _ fish farm. _ ” Eddy closes his eyes and takes three long shuddering breaths. “Screw you, Lex. I never asked you to help.”

Alexa is at a loss for words. She watches Eddy crumple down into a heap, sinking down into a ball, back against the car. She watches him break down, sob with regret and pain, and she hates herself for only being able to offer tissues. In the end, Eddy’s leaning against her, and they watch the sun go down. Alexa doesn’t trust herself to say anything, and Eddy’s said enough. The silence is filled with guilt and grief, sorrow and self-reproach, contrition and condemnation. 

“At least he’s happier without me,” Eddy says finally, shocking Alexa out of her half-slumber. “I don’t need to be happy as long as he is.”

* * *

  
  


_ Baby, please come home _

_ They're singing Deck The Halls _

_ But it's not like Christmas at all _

_ I remember when you were here _

* * *

  
  


Emma drags Brett home, a dead weight in his drunken stupor. He almost falls as she tries to get his keys out of his pocket, and then fumble for the lights. 

Brett hisses like a cat met with water when the light floods the apartment, and Emma rolls her eyes. With unknown strength she lugs him all the way to his room, and manages to somehow get him on his bed. She doesn’t bother with the covers, but leaves a glass of water and a bucket on his bedside table.

She sighs in pity when she shuts Brett’s front door, slipping the keys in a nearby flowerpot after checking if there’s no one along the corridors. (Not that there would be, it’s past 2am.)

Brett throws up four times after Emma leaves, and finally forces himself to shower and brush his teeth. Then he sits on the edge of his bed, and buries his head in his hands, and cries. He doesn’t know how long he cries for, because he falls asleep eventually, and wakes up when the sun rises. He looks at the empty side of the bed, the one he still doesn’t sleep on even though he almost falls off the bed sleeping on his side.

“God, Eddy. I miss you.”

* * *

  
  


Eddy and Alexa sing karaoke on her home system, belting trashy pop love songs at the top of their lungs. There’s an unopened bottle of wine sitting on the coffee table, and two more empty ones lying on the carpet. 

Alexa throws up seven times before Eddy has enough sense to stop refilling her glass and send her to bed. Eddy can’t sleep, so he gets up onto Alexa’s balcony to watch the moon clear the sky in a smooth arc. 

The stolen fish swim in the same bucket (that they also stole), and the water ripples gently in the soft wind. They ended up getting a tow for the rented car, and they shared a silent taxi ride home.

When Eddy can no longer see the moon and Alexa stirs on the couch behind him, he closes his eyes and leans back against the glass door of the balcony, bringing back memories of him and Brett watching the sun rise. He buries his face in his hands, but wills himself not to cry. He’s done enough of that to last him a lifetime.

“God, Brett. I miss you.”

**Author's Note:**

> okay look. if it hurt you that much reading imagine how much pain i had to go through to write this at 1am.
> 
> don't worry, it gets better, i promise, but for now it has to get alot worse first. i should be inclined to tell you now to pay attention to the dates at the beginning of the chapters, bc they are Important and you might get confused if you don't. 
> 
> also if u didn't see the series desc: these 13 fics can be read separately or in upload order. some of them are loosely connected while for others the connection is a bit more obvious.
> 
> to noot:   
> bish ur welcome i hope i managed to hurt you sufficiently for christmas >:( pls stop making me do this you unholy masochist /j   
> love you.


End file.
